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March is Women's History Month!

Stump Speeches On The Trail: Obama In Oskaloosa, Iowa

MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

Over the next several days, we're going to take a few minutes to listen to campaign stump speeches. We'll hear from Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, Joe Biden and today, President Obama. Here he is campaigning in Oskaloosa, Iowa.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: You may have heard that Governor Romney just chose his running mate, Congressman Ryan.

(LAUGHTER)

OBAMA: He's a good man. He's a family man. He's the ideological leader of the Republicans in Congress. And he's an articulate spokesperson for Governor Romney's views. The problem is those views are wrong.

(APPLAUSE)

OBAMA: I fundamentally disagree with their vision for America. Their basic prescription for America is to get rid of more regulations on big banks and big corporations, give more tax breaks to the very wealthiest Americans, and their belief is somehow that prosperity then will trickle down on everybody else. That's their view.

Look, the centerpiece of Governor Romney's entire economic plan - the centerpiece of it, his main idea - his one big idea is to give another $5 trillion tax cut on top of the Bush tax cuts that he's keeping - he wants to keep in place - $5 trillion. To give you some sense of that perspective, our entire defense budget is about half a trillion dollars a year. So this tax cut would be the equivalent of what we spend on the national defense every single year for the next 10 years - $5 trillion.

Last week, we found out that he expects you to pay the tab. Governor Romney's tax plan would actually raise taxes on middle-class families with children by an average of $2,000 to pay for this big tax break that's going mostly to the wealthiest folks.

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

An excerpt there of President Obama's stump speech delivered today in Iowa. And the president played to his Midwestern audience, talking up wind energy and taking a jab at his opponent.

OBAMA: I don't know if he's actually tried that. I know he's had other things on his car.

(LAUGHTER)

CORNISH: Tomorrow, we'll hear some cheeky jabs from the Republican side as we continue listening to the candidates' stump speeches. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.